Almost Heaven, West Virginia

As always, howdy howdy howdy from "The Gods Are Bored!" How are y'all?

Well, I think I'm a day behind the bell-ringing black magicians who want to void our Constitution and declare American dependence upon Jesus Christ. But that's okay! Consider me the cute little janitor who mops up after Mr. Peabody's and Sherman's big parade!

Whoa, sports fans. That sure dates me, doesn't it?

West Virginia is the state that needs cleansing today. To this I am firmly dedicated. You see, my conversion to Paganism became official in West Virginia. And when I need to meditate with the Salmon of Wisdom, it is to West Virginia that I return.

Little U.S. history here: When the Civil War began, Virginia seceded from the Union. But fully half the state consisted of rugged mountaineers who farmed difficult terrain for a subsistence living, using only themselves and their children as the workers. These people did not support slavery. So they didn't want to secede. Magnanimous President Lincoln declared them a state all unto themselves. And if ever a division of territory was meet and just, this was the occasion.

As for my conversion to Paganism, it was a slow process, beginning with connection to the Divine Feminine through the Blessed Mother of God. Which of course has no place in Methodism, except for the teenager who gets to dress up like Mary for the Xmas pageant.

More and more I began to pray to the Blessed Mother. More and more I began to feel Faerie all around me. I read up on Discordianism (a real favorite) and began to explore the Druid path. But slowly.

Then it hit.

My dad broke his hip. He was in end stages of Parkinson's Disease. When I went to see him in the nursing home, he told me he saw Peter Pan in the doorway of his room, "just standing there, with his hands on his hips."

Shaken by the sight of my dad in his last days, I got in his car and drove to Berkeley Springs, WV. For years I had been dreaming of a sacred spring that would heal my sorrows. Literally, readers. Years. In my dreams I was always looking for it. Little did I know that it was Berkeley Springs, a town near where I grew up, but just far enough away that I only went there at night, for away football games.

By day I discovered that Berkeley Springs is a warm springs (charming place), and for twenty bucks you can bathe in a huge tub of heated springwater.

It's like that tub of Berkeley Springs water just washed away the Fertile Crescent god entirely. What was already eroding just plain exploded. I went into that bath house one person, and came out an entirely different person.

And when I emerged into the air, the whole universe had expanded before me. I felt Divine from a hundred thousand sources. Not just one pantheon, not just one vulture in the sky. Everywhere.

I felt Faerie too. Major Faerie. And yes, I could see Them at that moment. Some were in the spillway, some were playing with the children, and Some were across the street in the window of a store. (Jules Enchanting Gifts, see Sidebar.)

Three months later, this blog was born. It is dedicated to any and every deity that can or could be called "Pagan." I once told Isaac Bonewits that I'm not a polytheist, I'm an omnitheist. Show me your deity, and I will praise Him/Her/It.

I follow the Druid path, somewhat. I say somewhat because I even believe in the Fomorians and Fir Bolgs and all the deities displaced by the Celtic pantheon. None of this matters, though. Divine is everywhere. It cannot be quantified, reified, or understood with our limited brain function.

Thank you, thank you, West Virginia. State of my heart. Love of my life. Forget the "almost." The place is Heaven. Ask any bored deitiy. Ask me.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.

--Bill of Rights, U.S. Constitution
"When I die, won't you bury me in the mountains? Far away in my Blue Ridge Mountain home."

Fightin' Fire with Fire

Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored" on a rainy afternoon! I'm your host, Anne Johnson. Today we're gonna talk about flag-burning, specifically the Confederate battle flag better known as the "Stars and Bars."

Depending upon where you went to school, you learned this about the Civil War:

1. It was a war aiming to keep the United States together rather than allowing it to break into two nations. The issue that caused the division was human slavery and a state's right to decide whether or not to allow said slavery. When the North perceived it was winning the war, President Lincoln freed the slaves. The North won the war, and the United States remained united, thus beginning an international superpower state that today is one of the dominant nations in the world.

2. It was a war of aggression foisted upon a peace-loving group of states whose economy was influenced by the gentle use of agreeable domestic servants. Though a vast majority of its soldiers fought not because of slavery but because of states' rights, the cause was in vain. This brave attempt to create a nation was brutally crushed, in some cases by slash-and-burn methods. Nevertheless, almost a century and a half since the end of the conflict, a nationalist pride still burns in the breasts of the people so brutally treated, especially but not exclusively those who can trace ancestry to soldiers who participated in the failed attempt at nationhood.

I'm gonna let you figure out which history lesson you're likely to get in New Jersey, and which you'll get in Mississippi.

However you feel about the good ol' Confederate States of America, you can't deny that its battle flag (which was never the national flag) still has a mighty potency as a symbol. Many of the people who wear it, fly it, display it, or revere it, are racists. A few are nationalists who've never accepted Lee's surrender. There's also another core group of people who use this flag as a symbol not because they're racist, or want the South to rise again, but just to look like badass rebels.

You'll see the Stars and Bars all over the place in West Virginia,  even though that state exists because the people living there in 1860 did not want to secede. Just recently, I saw a teenager in the Eastern Panhandle with the Stars and Bars on the back of his t-shirt. The caption read: "This shouldn't piss you off, but if it does, oh well." The kid knows he's gonna piss people off by wearing that shirt ... and most of the people he'll piss off aren't black people, because there aren't very many black people in that area. This kid is probably racist, but more probably he's rebellious. If he can fight you one-on-one and win, what does it matter why he's fighting? He's a big badass, a tough guy, someone who ought to get laid by pretty girls.

I'm a big fan of Jesus' General, one of the blogosphere's premiere commanders in the War on Morons. JG has begun a Facebook group called "Burn the Confederate Flag Day" and has named September 12, 2010 for the first conflagration. Why 9/12? Because it's a big Tea Party rally day. What better way to expose the racism in the Tea Party than to set the Stars and Bars ablaze at counter protests?

I joined the "Burn the Confederate Flag Day" not because I intend to burn a Confederate flag. (I'll get to that in a minute.) Principally I just want to see the level of vitriol that Jesus' General is going to incur by suggesting such an affront. So far the spectacle has been interesting, to say the least -- and the concept hasn't gone viral yet.

Yes, I am a little afraid that "belonging" to such a group will get me hacked. But I love a good debate.

Here's why I'm occasionally in favor of burning Old Glory but not in favor of burning the Stars and Bars.

Burning Old Glory generally happens when a portion of the populace is disgruntled by the decisions being made by the national government. It is therefore a protest against a national policy.

Burning the Stars and Bars is different. It sends a message of contempt to a certain segment of the population, not to the government. And whenever you heap contempt on certain segments of the population, you reflect badly in the glare of the fire.

And yet the glorious Jesus' General has had to take this step because no one with a reasonable agenda has risen to oppose the Tea Party. Where are the organizers of "Wear a Red Cross If You're Uninsured Day?" How about a nostalgic, "Make Love Not War" protest (considering that the Tea Party's aim is to cut government spending, but they don't ever say a word about the defense budget)? As a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution, I would personally be thrilled with a "Go Back Home If Your Ancestors Weren't Here in 1776" Day. Quick! Someone tell me how that would affect the population of the USA? If you said there would be a much higher percentage of African Americans, BING! You're right.

We at "The Gods Are Bored" heartily endorse counter-protests on Tea Party Day. It's just the whole Stars and Bars flag-burning thing we don't like. They lost the war like egg-sucking dogs, and they're still waving that flag. Isn't that pathetic enough? They used it to frighten black people, and now our president is black. Isn't that statement enough about the power of that loser flag? Gosh, if you burn it, how will we know which ones are the moron rebel racists?

My solution for Jesus' General? Let's collect the Social Security and Medicare cards of the Tea Partiers and burn those instead! Assuming, of course, that the Tea Partiers aren't going to resort to such effective statements themselves.